LINUX GAMING

Game Launchers

Launch into play.

Game launchers on Linux give you one place to organize, install, and play your games. They streamline your library and make gaming more accessible.

NOTICE

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Steam

Setup: Very easy

Wayland

Description

Steam is the world’s largest digital game platform, combining a vast store with a feature-rich launcher. It supports achievements, mods, cloud saves, Big Picture Mode, and Proton for running Windows titles on Linux systems.

Preinstalled runners

Proton

store.steampowered.com

Heroic

Setup: Moderate

Wayland

Description

Heroic is a modern, open-source game launcher for Linux, Windows, and macOS. It focuses on Epic Games and GOG libraries, providing Wine/Proton compatibility layers, cloud saves, and a clean interface for managing game installs.

Preinstalled runners

heroicgameslauncher.com

Lutris

Setup: Moderate

Wayland

Description

Lutris is a powerful open-source game manager for Linux that unifies native games, emulators, Steam, GOG, Epic Games, and Wine titles. It simplifies installs, manages runners, and helps optimize games across different sources.

Preinstalled runners

lutris.net

Bottles

Setup: Easy

X11, Wayland

Description

Bottles is a Linux launcher that simplifies running Windows software using Wine and custom environments. It offers presets for games and applications, dependency management, and sandboxed "bottles" for clean isolation.

Preinstalled runners

GE-Proton

WINE

usebottles.com

RetroArch

Setup: Easy

Wayland

Description

RetroArch is a versatile frontend for emulators, game engines, and media players. It provides a unified interface for retro gaming, complete with shaders, netplay, rewinding, and a rich library of community-driven cores.

Preinstalled runners

retroarch.com